Parents of students in the East Baton Rouge Parish School System are the “true stakeholders” in the debate over how to restructure the school district, and should be actively included in those discussions, representatives from the local education group One Community, One School District emphasized at a meeting Tuesday.

Plans like the one recently announced by the Baton Rouge Area Chamber, which intends to introduce legislation that would reshape the district, have lacked that parent input thus far, said Belinda Davis, One Community, One School District’s president.

“Business leaders should absolutely be involved in education reform and improving educational outcomes in our school district,” Davis said. “But they shouldn’t necessarily be leading it. We believe that parents in the East Baton Rouge Parish School System and all across the state should be leading the effort to reform education in our communities.”

BRAC’s plan is only one proposal affecting the district expected to be introduced at the legislature this year. Davis spoke at Tuesday’s meeting at the Main Library about the different bills and the group’s position on them. One Community, One School District lobbied during the last two legislative sessions against the creation of the Southeast school district -- the predecessor to the campaign to incorporate the city of St. George -- and has spoken out against the new city as well.

Much of BRAC’s proposal to revamp East Baton Rouge’s school system remains a mystery, Davis said. The organization has described a set of general principles it will use in drafting legislation, such as giving more autonomy to principals, more school control to the community, and reducing the size and scope of the school board. But actual legislation hasn’t been presented yet. BRAC officials say they have plenty of time to do so before the deadline for introducing bills on April 1, and they are now gathering community input by asking people to email their thoughts to communityschools@brac.org.

Davis, however, questioned whether there’s time to put together a well-thought-out bill this legislative session. The legislative session, which lasts three months, began this week.

“We deserve better than a rushed process that doesn’t take our considerations into account,” Davis said.

State Rep. Ted James, D-Baton Rouge, who said he had just left a meeting with BRAC CEO Adam Knapp, told the audience that they are working to put together a larger community meeting on the issue.

Other bills expected to be introduced in the legislature include bills by state Sen. Bodi White, R-Central, and state Rep. Hunter Greene, R-Baton Rouge, that seek to streamline the process for creating a breakaway school district in a community. Instead of needing a constitutional amendment to set up funding for a new school district -- which requires a two-thirds vote in the legislature -- they would only need a simple majority vote to form the district. Greene’s bill also calls for a public election to be held in the area where the new district would be formed, as well as the existing district.

Davis said One Community, One School District opposes removing the “high bar” of the two-thirds vote.

“Creating new school districts is a complicated business and our students deserve a well-thought-out process,” she said. “That’s what this constitutional amendment does. It creates a bar that makes it harder for them to (create breakaway school districts) willy-nilly.”

The group also opposes White’s bill to divide the district into four “sub-districts” of North, Mid City, South and Southeast. Davis said it would create “unfunded mandates,” by requiring each subdistrict to offer magnet programs. She also raised concerns about the racial implications of dividing the district, saying it could attract the attention of the Department of Justice. Based on the demographics of Baton Rouge, the North district could be expected to have a large majority of black students, and the South and Southeast districts would have large majorities of white students.

And like BRAC’s proposal, Davis said White’s plan didn’t involve community input.

“I firmly believe that plans to change the fundamental structure of our school district should not be made without input from people like you,” she said.

White has said the bill is an effort to “entertain negotiations” with those who want to make changes to the school system while keeping it as one district rather than forming new districts in the South and Southeast.

There are other bills that One Community, One School District supports. They include James’ proposal to require that the Recovery School District allows local school districts to use any buildings that were taken over by the RSD and then closed, and a bill by state Rep. Gregory Miller to change the funding structure of charter schools so that districts would be able to keep money to pay for retiree benefit obligations.